The Way I See It is a blog published at least three times a week containing thoughts and analysis and irreverent musings on the local, state, and national sports world.

Kirksville Lady Tigers are rolling

About this blog

By Dennis Miller

My name is Dennis Miller and I am a lifelong resident of Kirksville, MO. I have been totally blind since birth and a sports fanatic just as long. I like all sports but love baseball and am a proud lifelong member of Cardinal Nation. It is my honor
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My name is Dennis Miller and I am a lifelong resident of Kirksville, MO. I have been totally blind since birth and a sports fanatic just as long. I like all sports but love baseball and am a proud lifelong member of Cardinal Nation. It is my honor to be given the opportunity to write a blog for the Kirksville Daily Express and I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoy writing it.

The Kirksville High School Lady Tigers improved to 18 and 1 on Tuesday night with another impressive victory over a totally overmatched Moberly team. The Lady Tigers are truly a well rounded team in my opinion who not only win consistently but do it in a totally dominating fashion. In addition to their excellent offensive output this year their defense has been top notch as well and it has been a joy to watch these young ladies come together as a team over the past couple of years. Their next game is Friday night at home for Court Warming. If you haven’t taken the opportunity to get out and see these young ladies in action then I would strongly encourage you to do so. There are not many more opportunities to see them in action this year as the season is winding down quickly.

The KHS boys basketball team came up a little short in their game with Moberly on Tuesday night as Moberly was able to come up with a hard fought victory. The Tigers are certainly an improved team over last year but have struggled for consistency at times as they haven’t always been able to put together a solid game on both ends of the floor. They will be back in action on Friday as well at home against Mexico.

The KHS wrestling team is preparing for districts this weekend in St. Charles. Since when is St. Charles in our district and why is it in our district in the first place? If you have to drive three and a half hours to get there then it is not in your district I don’t care what the Missouri State High School Activities Association says. Anyway, the KHS wrestling team has had a week to prepare and I expect most if not all the team to place well in the districts and move on to state competition later this month in Columbia which is about half as far away as St. Charles.

The Truman State Bulldogs men’s and women’s basketball teams both hit the road to travel to lands far away as they play Pittsburg State on Thursday before heading to Oklahoma to play Northeastern Oklahoma on Saturday. I could complain about the nonsensical schedule but I’ve already done that. I would however as a parting shot like to point out to the good folks who run the MIAA that Oklahoma is not exactly mid America, but obviously geography has no place in modern college athletics.

The Missouri Tigers men’s basketball team, (Missouri isn’t in the southeastern United States either but I’ve already gone down that road) heads to College Station, TX on Thursday night to play Texas AandM in a game featuring the two newest teams in the SEC. Missouri is still looking for its first road win in the SEC and they have never played that well in College Station so they are certainly going to have to play a consistent game from start to finish and get back to the Tigers of December to come out of there with a victory.

Pitchers and catchers start reporting for spring training this weekend and the St. Louis Cardinals spring training and season as a whole got a little more complicated on Tuesday afternoon with the announcement that Chris Carpenter likely will not pitch this season and quite possibly will never pitch again. Carpenter has had so many surgeries on his arm and shoulder that I have lost track of them has pitched with some level of discomfort for the past seven years and it was hoped that a radical nerve operation last year would alleviate that but it simply never happened. Carpenter has experienced renewed discomfort during his off season workouts and the decision was made to finally shut him down for good last weekend. Carpenter has been counted out before only to battle back and pitch again but this time it has a sense of finality which is truly heartbreaking. Carpenter was more than just one of the best pitchers in baseball but was also the on and off the field leader for the Cardinals who seemed to thrive on his toughness and ability to overcome adversity. This leaves a lot of unanswered questions about the Cardinals pitching staff as there is still some uncertainty as to when or even if Jaime Garcia will be able to pitch because of shoulder problems. The Cardinals have plenty of young arms but are they ready to step into the major league rotation on a fulltime basis yet? Do you want that many unproven commodities in your rotation? What about Jake Westbrook who also battled injuries last year and also seems to have some head issues that can make for an interesting combination. One possibility is the signing of free agent Kyle Lohse who was probably the most consistent pitchers the Cardinals had last year but was not always given a lot of offensive support. Lohse is still a free agent due to a loophole in the agreement between MLB and its players which would cause any team who signs him to lose draft picks because the Cardinals made him a qualifying offer earlier this winter. Most teams are not willing to give up draft picks in addition to paying him the salry he is asking for. This could eventually lead to him coming back to the Cardinals because it was the only option for both of them.

We’ll be back on Friday with a look ahead to this weekend’s sports action as well as our thoghts on the Missouri Tigers and Truman State Bulldogs games Thursday night. Please check out the other blogs on this site and thanks as always for supporting this one.
Have a terrific Wednesday!